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Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Linux Mint is one of the few Linux distros that I normally recommend to any newbie. It just works! This is possibly the most amazing thing about Mint. Whereas with rest of the Linux distros, I get to hear a lot of complains (even I have experienced for some). But, not a single one for Linux Mint. Any system you throw at it, it will always work! Perhaps this is what separates Mint from rest of the Linux distros that it is numero uno in Distrowatch ranking for quite sometime!

I missed an early review of Linux Mint 15, nicknamed "Olivia", as I was enjoying my vacations. It is a bit late to review Linux Mint 15 but never the less I wanted to review it. As usual, for this test I downloaded the 32-bit ISOs of both Mate and Cinnamon releases.The release note of Mint Olivia states some significant improvements:

"The team is proud to announce the release of Linux
Mint 15 'Olivia'. Linux Mint 15 is the most ambitious release since the
start of the project. MATE 1.6 is greatly improved and Cinnamon 1.8
offers a ton of new features, including a screensaver and a unified
control center. The login screen can now be themed in HTML 5 and two new
tools, 'Software Sources' and 'Driver Manager', make their first
appearance in Linux Mint. MDM now features 3 greeters (i.e. login screen
applications): a GTK+ greeter, a themeable GDM greeter for which
hundreds of themes are available, and a brand-new HTML greeter, also
themeable which supports a new generation of animated and interactive
themes."

Linux Mint "Olivia" comes with Linux kernel
3.8.0-19 and is supported
for 6 months, till Oct'13. Desktop choices are Mate 1.6.0 and Cinnamon
1.8. For installation, I used my Asus K54C laptop
with 2.2 Ghz Core i3 processor and 2 GB RAM. With Unetbootin, I created
live USB's of each, did a live boot to test and finally install. I
tried out both the flavors for a week (installed in partitions) and
finally decided to write a review. The 32-bit ISOs of both Mate and
Cinnamon are around 1 GB and won't fit in a CD. Anyway, who
uses CD these days?InstallationInstallation of Linux Mint is typical Ubuntu and no surprises there. The information
required are location, language, keyboard preferences, location to
install and finally user ID creation. It takes about 30 minutes to
install, including installation of updates, just like Ubuntu.

Aesthetics & Hardware RecognitionAlthough professionalism and refinement is evident in the distro starting from boot splash to desktop, Linux Mint 15 comes in it's good old bland ash colored wallpaper with white (Mate) or black (Cinnamon) lower panel. The login screen for Cinnamon version looks really cool but Mate release has the same default login. It is a typical Windows XP look and will make new switchers from Windows comfortable. Fortunately quite a few good wallpapers and
loads of to-be-installed themes (for Cinnamon) are there as a saving
grace. With these and adding a conky, I could transform the desktop to
my liking!

Cinnamon version comes with quite a few attractive themes and has some subtle but really
cool effects like windows disappearing with effect upon minimizing,
popping up when maximized, etc. but nothing too gaudy to distract user's
attention.

Hardware recognition is the best in Linux Mint among all Linux distros I have used and it could recognise Wifi, screen resolution, sound
card and touchpad automatically. ApplicationsBoth Mate and Cinnamon versions have more or less similar set of applications with some minor differences, viz.

Application list is very comprehensive and it has most of daily use apps. Mate has pluma in place of gedit as text editor. Rest of the softwares are the same.Linux Mint 15 came with all multimedia codecs and Adobe flashplugin pre-installed and it is actually helpful for the new users.

For Cinnamon, Nemo 1.8.2 is the default file
manager and Mate has Caja 1.6.1. Both are very efficient and comes with all possible hard drive and
networking options on the left hand side, so that users can drag and
drop files for copying. Also, disk usage information is flashed in the
bottom panel, which I find advantageous. Nemo, of course, looks more attractive than Caja.

Cinnamon Integrated SettingsCinnamon
1.8 has got a new integrated settings. Earlier version had two settings
options - one for Cinnamon (with very few entries) and rest of the
settings would appear in another settings menu. It was really confusing
for starters and I feel, this is a good incremental innovation.

RepositoryLinux Mint derives it's
applications from Ubuntu Raring Ringtail repos but has a different GUI for the same - Mint Installer. Further, Mint provides some applications of it's own to the users, like Image writer (Mint Image writer is different from Ubuntu Image writer). Also, the good old terminal is present to download apps, for
experienced users. For update notification, an update manager is also
present.

From repos, I installed a host of applications like Chromium browser, docky, cairo dock, conky, etc.
All worked as expected.

Given my system didn't have any other graphic card except Intel GPU, I couldn't test the new addition "Driver Manager". PerformanceFor Snowlinux, I noted Mate version to outperform the Cinnamon one. However, Linux Mint Mate and Cinnamon versions actually provide similar performance. At steady state, with task manager running,
it consumes about 170-180 MB of RAM and 1-5% CPU. Both ran really smooth on
my system.If I compare Mint 15 to Ubuntu
13.04 & Snowlinux 4 Mate & Cinnamon editions, LM 15 Cinnamon is possibly best among the Cinnamon spins I have used so far. It offers a blend of both aesthetics and performance. However, I can't say the same thing about LM 15 Mate. Snowlinux 4 Mate actually offers better performance. One advantage that Linux Mint distros offer is that they take almost similar space as Ubuntu and are not bloated like Snowlinux.

OS

Size of ISO

Base

Desktop

Linux kernel

CPU Usage

RAM usage

Snowlinux 4 Mate

919 MB

Ubuntu

Mate 1.6.0

3.8.0-23

1-5%

120 MB

Snowlinux 4 Glacier Mate

980 MB

Debian

Mate 1.4

'3.5.0

1-5%

147 MB

Mint 201303 Cinnamon

1.3 GB

Debian

Cinnamon 1.6

3.2.0

1-10%

162 MB

Linux Mint 15 Cinnamon

973 MB

Ubuntu

Cinnamon 1.8

3.8.0-19

1-10%

173 MB

Sabayon 11 Mate

848 MB

Gentoo

Mate 1.4.1

3.7.0

1-5%

174 MB

Linux Mint 15 Mate

1.1 GB

Ubuntu

Mate 1.6.0

3.8.0-19

1-5%

174 MB

Mint 201303 Mate

1.3 GB

Debian

Mate 1.4

3.2.0

1-5%

175 MB

Mint 13 Cinnamon

857 MB

Ubuntu

Cinnamon 1.4

3.2.0-23

6-10%

200 MB

Mint 14 Mate

1 GB

Ubuntu

Mate 1.4

3.5.0-17

1-5%

200 MB

Mint 13 Mate

942 MB

Ubuntu

Mate 1.2

3.2.0-23

1-5%

207 MB

Mint 14 Cinnamon

922 MB

Ubuntu

Cinnamon 1.6.7

3.5.0-17

20-35%

221 MB

Ubuntu 12.04.2 LTS

693 MB

Ubuntu

Unity with Gnome 3.4

3.5.0

1-10%

230 MB

Snowlinux 3 White Mate

827 MB

Ubuntu

Mate 1.4

3.5.0-17

1-5%

240 MB

Snowlinux 4 Cinnamon

849 MB

Ubuntu

Cinnamon 1.8

3.8.0-23

1-10%

245 MB

Snowlinux 3 White CInnamon

760 MB

Ubuntu

Cinnamon 1.6.7

3.5.0-17

1-5%

260 MB

Ubuntu 12.04.1 LTS

730 MB

Ubuntu

Unity with Gnome 3.4

3.2.0-29

1-10%

280 MB

Ubuntu 13.04 Gnome

1 GB

Ubuntu

Gnome 3.8

3.8.0

1-10%

280 MB

Ubuntu 13.04

835 MB

Ubuntu

Unity with Gnome 3.6

3.8.0

1-10%

320 MB

Ubuntu 12.10

790 MB

Ubuntu

Unity with Gnome 3.6

3.5.0-17

1-10%

412 MB

OS

Installation Size

Ubuntu 13.04

4.98 GB

Linux Mint 15 Cinnamon

8.58 GB

Linux Mint 15 Mate

4.90 GB

Snowlinux 4 Cinnamon

12.00 GB

Snowlinux 4 Mate

11.58 GB

Stability of both Mate &
Cinnamon (thankfully) are better than Ubuntu Unity. I didn't note any
annoying pop-ups of some back-end programs crashing, during my one week
usage.OverallI would rate Linux Mint 15 Cinnamon among the best Cinnamon spins I have used in the last couple of years. It offers really good performance and consumes resources similar to what you see in any XFCE distro. Additionally, it offers quite a few cool effects, loads of themes to add variety, desk applets, etc. However, the Mate release is more functional and it too works well. But, I have used better Mate release from Snowlinux. Linux Mint 15 is definitely a great release but the most unfortunate part is that Mint is not upgradable. It takes the shine out of it a bit as you can use the fantastic installation till Oct'13. Possibly Mint can start a semi-rolling release distro for Ubuntu as well (like it has for Debian or like Fuduntu had for Fedora).

Otherwise, there is no better distro for beginners than Linux Mint. Even for experienced users it gives a rock solid stable distro which just works on any system you throw at it. The same legacy continues with Mint 15 Olivia as well. In
overall, I recommend Mint 15 Cinnamon to those who want to try out Linux as well as for those who love GNOME but hate what they have done to it in GNOME3 or what Ubuntu has done to it in Unity.You can download the 32 and 64 bit versions from here.

Hi Arindam,I use LM 14 XFCE on my PC which is quite old(Intel core2duo with 1 GB RAM). I'm planning to hold on to it until the support ends by April 2014. Will there be another XFCE version in the next LTS release?Thanks.

I am hoping for another LTS XFCE release from Linux Mint camp in 2014 :). Even if it is not there, you can please try out Manjaro XFCE if you want a long term solution for your computer. It has a rolling release and is very good.

Thanks for liking my review. Linux Mint Debian Cinnamon/Mate is lighter and faster than Mint 15. Also, it has a semi rolling release which may be advantage over the long term. However, unavailability of latest applications will be there as things more towards Debian 8. Further, occasional instability can't be ruled out as it happens to most of the rolling release distros. And this one is supported till Debian 8 comes out! Definitely an attractive proposition if you are thinking of not changing your OS for next 2-3 years, in my opinion.

Some experience with the Ubuntu family but new to Mint, & very impressed - for me, along with Crunchbang, Mint is the co-champion of working right from the start with minimal hassle & reliability ... not to mention having a lot of what I need pre-installed.

I tried and tried... wifi worked for about 10 minutes then never worked again. Unfortunately I've tried many distros and each time it's back to the command line in some nerdy way to *fix* things that work in windows. It's still not worth the switch for me. It does however look lovely!

Tried it, does not work with built in sound card, can't seem to decide if the headphone is plugged in or not (it's not).

Nice GUI, but like other Linux, not PnP. Might use it as a simple static workstation environment but for a dynamic development system where hardware changes are always taking place it is just not there yet.

And if rumor is true, you need to rebuild the system to upgrade every 9 months or so, this would make it a toy.

Hi Sen, I am a follower of your Linux reviews on your blog, I love your blog, it's awesome, no one does more and better reviews than you.I only wanted to ask you for a good distro for my HP Pavilion g6 1309ss laptop, I tried several distros including several Linux Mint and I always get the same problem, extreme heat and poor battery life :(Thanks a lot, and keep working so best on your blog!!

Thanks for liking my reviews. Sure, I can possibly help you in this regard, having faced similar kind of issues previously with my laptop. Can you please check what graphic card you are using? If you are using Linux, you can check graphic card specifications by running the following command in terminal:lspci -v

Please paste the output in reply and possibly we can diagnose the reason of overheating.

I did what you told me, lspci -v, and this is what i got http://pastebin.com/JsdmHPWCI have a dual graphics system, an AMD 7450M and an Intel Graphics 3000, but I don't know what graphics card is working...

Possibly your laptop overheating is due to non-installation of AMD proprietary drivers. You can please follow the instructions given in my article on how to install AMD drivers.http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in/2013/07/installing-amd-radeon-drivers-in-linux.html

It works for 7450M that you have. Please try it and let me know if it helps.

Dear Arindam,Thanks for this good review.However, on installing Mint Mate 15 I notice that I am unable to access the mail.yahoo.com site, in that even the login screen is also not offered. I have tried this on the latest live editions of Cinnamon 15, Fedora, Zorin OS (thats is a lot of testing) but withot being able to access mail.yahoo.com in any one of them. Maybe the fault is in my system.This is same on firefox and chrome.I have dual boot with windows 7 ultimate and have no problem in accessing mail.yahoo.com on it.Would appreciate any help/advice to overcome this problem.thanks

Surprising! Definitely it is not the fault of Linux OS. I use Yahoo mail regularly through Firefox and Chrome in Ubunut, Zorin and Mint. Even just now I checked my yahoo mail to confirm in Linux Mint 15. So, a few queries for you to pin point the problem:

Are the cookies disabled in the Linux you are trying out? Are you using a live CD or live USB? Third, have you checked any other email ID like gmail, etc. on your live edition? Also, is the internet, in general, working in the live boot?

I fyou can please provide answer to these queries, it will help me know the exact nature of the problem. Otherwise, everything works on the Linux distros I use. I am using Linux only for last 4 years and I don't use Windows except at Office (where I can't use anything else, rules are rules!). And I haven't faced anything like that. Sounds interesting! If you can please provide me answer to the queries posted, may be I can diagnose the exact nature of the problem.

Great review.Can you resume in a few words what are the main differences between Cinnamon, Mate and xfce?? I think it's a little confusing for the newbies. I think the order is Cinnamon > Mate > xfce, in order of visual quality, but also in machine resources.Thanks

Thanks for liking my review. Actually the story of Cinnamon and Mate started with the GNOME developers deciding to discard GNOME 2 and move to a new desktop, the GNOME 3. Initially GNOME 3 was really a big pain and not very intuitive like GNOME 2 used to be. That is when other developers came up with Cinnamon and Mate. Here is my 2 cents:

Cinnamon: is forked from GNOME 3 and is easier to use than GNOME 3. It gives a simple intuitive experience but is heavier than Mate and XFCE. It used to be a bit unstable last year but is doing better now. It comes with a lot of customization and themes to enrich the user experience.

Mate: Is more stable and forked from GNOME 2. I found it to be a bit boring to use though much more efficient than Cinnamon.

XFCE: My favorite and is different from GNOME. It is very efficient and lightweight desktop. The best part is customization. I can customize it to make it look like a Mac OS X or even Windows 7. It is intuitive to use and supported by almost all Linux OSs that I know of.

If you think of visual attractiveness, I would rate Cinnamon the best, closely followed by XFCE (but requires to be tweaked). Mate looks a bit pale in comparison.

Sadly, I can not say the same. I had the most easy setting you can imagine. From DVD on to an Asus Eee PC (AMD C-60), MINT only, nothing else on it. But it did not work.

I downloaded Mint 15 (Mate) 64bit. Went through the install process, setting for delete HDD and install only Mint 15. Install finished, shutting down, DVD came out, hitting return, nothing happens. Last status note was about modem... something. It just freezes. I had to shut down manually and after restart it just asks for a boot drive. And I got stuck there. I installed the whole thing 3 times and its always the same result.

Bad experience for me who makes first steps with Linux. Nothing works.

You wrote, "Linux Mint 15 is definitely a great release but the most unfortunate part is that Mint is not upgradable. It takes the shine out of it a bit as you can use the fantastic installation till Oct'13."

I'm a new to Linux. Does this mean it stops working on Oct'13 or what?Thanks

It won't stop working after Oct'13 but security updates won't be available. As it is Linux, I can assure you it won't matter like what happens in Windows but you'll be stuck with old applications. Best option is to install the 13 series of Linux Mint, it has support till April 2017.

With Distros such as Ubuntu, people can upgrade their installation to a new version without doing a complete reinstall. Many users find that a fresh install works better.

With Mint, package installs are discouraged and most users who want to upgrade simply do a new install of the new version from a DVD or USB. One just makes a list of the sofware one uses, backs up data and then does the install.

Mint and Ubuntu installs are so quick and easy that I've never seen much benefit in upgrading by any other method other than a fresh install.

Hi Arindam,I am really fascinated by the screenshot of the very first picture. But this is not acieved just with the Linux mint 15. Did you install some other themes, can you please tell me. how exactly can i reproduce the same styled theme on my system.- regardsAravind

Your laptop specs are good enough to run all the Linux distros. My recommendation would depend on what stage of Linux knowledge evolution you are in. For example:

(1) Want to try out Linux: Linux Mint 13 Cinnamon or wait for Linux Mint 17 Cinnamon too come out in 2014. Meanwhile, you can give a shot to Mint 16 Cinnamon to gain experience.(2) Already have some experience in Linux: Ubuntu 12.04.3 or wait for Ubuntu 14.04 to come out in 2014; Kubuntu 12.04.3, specially if you like Windows 7 and Ubuntu Unity desktop is a shocker to you(3) Have used Linux for more than 6-8 months for all purposes: OpenSUSE KDE, SolydXK, Manjaro XFCE/KDE - all rolling release ones and never require installing again. But, there may be bouts of instability in between and it requires a bit of experience to resolve.

Also, if you like an awesome looking desktop, you can select between Deepin Linux, Netrunner or Zorin OS 6. Please select the LTS version from these distros (the one based on Ubuntu 12.04 or upcoming release based on 14.04). The LTS versions tend to be more stable.

I hope my reply does provide some solution to you. The beauty of Linux is that there is a distro for almost every user. Somethings that appeal to one user may not appeal to another and hence, having options is critical here.

Please try the distros that I mentioned and you may find your right fit.